Classic Albee takes stage for first time at Seattle Rep

(l to r) Amy Hill, Aaron Blakely, Pamela Reed and R. Hamilton Wright in Seattle Repertory Theatre’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? Photo: Alabastro Photography

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf

Seattle Repertory Theatre

Through May 18

The explosive, immersive, three hour drama, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, by Edward Albee is on stage now at Seattle Rep. If you thought August: Osage County was caustic, you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet, sister. This play will blister your paint and warp your wood. The games played by George and Martha make Russian roulette look silly.

This is an American classic that practically became classic the minute Albee stopped writing it in 1962. It won the 1963 Tony Award for Best Play. You may know it best from the 1966 movie starring Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, George Segal and Sandy Dennis. Here, the four dynamic talents are R. Hamilton Wright, Pamela Reed, Aaron Blakely and Amy Hill.

This production is lovingly mounted by director Braden Abraham, with delightful set by Matthew Smucker with massive help from the Seattle Rep scene techs. During the two intermissions, you might take time to look at the academic flotsam and jetsam collected on multiple floor to ceiling bookshelves, as if jammed in there over years. Lighting by L.B. Morse and sound by Matt Starritt perfectly accompany the evening.

eSe Teatro hard at work promoting and educating Latino actors

Charise Castro Smith

On April 13th, on a relatively balmy afternoon at ACT Theatre, eSe Teatro artistic director Rose Cano managed a new effort to introduce Latino actors to the Seattle theaters for consideration in near-future productions.

For the first ever NW Regional Latino Auditions, approximately 45 mostly local actors, but also from as far away as Chicago and Los Angeles, strutted their stuff before a powerhouse list of regional companies: Seattle Repertory, Book-It Repertory, ACT Theatre (host company), Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Miracle (Milagro) Theatre Group, Latino Theatre Projects, Washington Ensemble Theatre and a few more. Washington Ensemble is mounting Charise Castro Smith’s play, The Hunchback of Seville, opening June 5th.

Each actor was given the standard three minutes to perform and many presented two short pieces. The mix of pieces ranged from very contemporary to classic Shakespearian and Spanish plays. Many of the performers chose to perform pieces that mixed Spanish and English to show their ability to perform in both languages. A number of performers were young men and women who are studying at Cornish or UW.

Acting up a (financial) storm in "Bethany"

Emily Chisholm in Bethany (photo Chris Bennion)

Bethany
by Laura Marks
ACT Theatre
through May 4

The new play, Bethany, at ACT Theatre moves so quickly and with such power that by the end, you may well feel a bit punched in the gut. Playwright Laura Marks likely does not expect you to like the characters in this play, but you can identify with them.

Director John Langs takes a spare script and amplifies moments with quiet scene play that illuminates the inner life of these characters, caught in 2009 in the devastation of the Great Recession. The play might be realistic and it might not. It teeters on the edge of the fantastical or allegorical with a (typically beautifully wrought) modern kitchen set design by Carey Wong, sometimes-haunting lighting by Andrew Smith and kickass sound design by Brendan Patrick Hogan.

(Side note: BPH's sound designs are things of beauty. It's not that the sound design is so well done that it does not fit the production, but that they fit the production so aptly and amplify it so deliciously that I just have to bust out and say so every once in a while!)

See "Shackleton" first, before NYC gets ahold of it

Valerie Vigoda and Wade McCollum (photo by Jeff Carpenter)

Ernest Shackleton Loves Me

Balagan Theatre

(at Seattle Repertory Theatre)

Through May 3

A hallucinating new mother/musician conjures explorer Ernest Shackleton via Skype to help her weather the winter storms of her failed relationship and her disappearing job in Balagan’s newest show. Ernest Shackleton Loves Me (in a co-production with both Seattle Repertory Theatre and ACT Theatre) is a tour de force performance from both of its two stars!

ESLM is well worth a visit. It’s a dense sound-and-light, rocking, lyrical extravaganza, with a bit of hootenanny thrown in.

Valerie Vigoda is both the lyric writer (book by Joe DiPietro and music by Brendan Milburn) and the hallucinating musician who creates the music right in front of us through the use of automated keyboards, sound looping, playback, an electric violin, and even an old reel-to-reel tape recorder! Vigoda is a wonder as we watch her swiftly and deliberately latch on her violin and flip switches and sing! She has a gorgeous voice, too.

Quick! That time of year for Live Girls

 Kasey Harrison, Matt Aguayo, Allison Yolo (photo by Steven Sterne)

Quickies 15
Live Girls! Theater
(at Theatre Off Jackson)
through May 10

Live Girls! Theater is presenting its 15th Annual iteration of Quickies, the short play program written only by women. It is always a well-produced evening, with choreographed and planned set changes that are integrated into the entire evening rather than apologetically or unapologetically and unartfully done in half light.

This year the offerings themselves are not as strong as some years, though a couple of them are very strong and well done. There are seven plays, four in the first act and three in the second. Also, you might win a prize after intermission for paying close attention to the first four plays! The theme this year was science and magic.

"Annie" is who again? The Horse in Motion debuts strongly and strangely

Kaillee Coleman, Elaine Huber and Chris Lee Hill (on the table). Photo credit Allyce Andrew

Attempts on Her Life
by Martin Crimp
The Horse in Motion
(at University Heights Center)
through April 27

The debut production from The Horse in Motion, a theater company mostly of UW grads, is definitely for recent UW grads. This is not to say it's not for others, but the edgy, character-less, roaming, episodic nature of this script by Martin Crimp is totally suited to the college crowd and those who like intellectual and even circular argument.

Attempts on Her Life, in script form, apparently does not even instruct who should speak what lines, or where the scenes take place, or time, or much else. It's the perfect vehicle for capturing the imaginations of this crew of theater-loving performers. So, they infuse the production with a variety of video images, locations, and moments, and spread them out throughout the University Heights center (it used to be a school).